James struck a light, and, the night being still, the flame burnt brightly: it showed us the mark of a horse's hoof, apparently quite fresh, and leading away from the lodge. We rose and went on, following the tracks by the aid of more matches till we reached a tree twenty yards from the door. Here the hoof marks ceased; but beyond there was a double track of human feet in the soft black earth; a man had gone thence to the house and returned from the house thither. On the right of the tree were more hoof-marks, leading up to it and then ceasing. A man had ridden up from the right, dismounted, gone on foot to the house, returned to the tree, remounted, and ridden away along the track by which we had approached.
"It may be somebody else," said I; but I do not think that we any of us doubted in our hearts that the tracks were made by the coming of Hentzau. Then the king had the letter; the mischief was done. We were too late.
Yet we did not hesitate. Since disaster had come, it must be faced. Mr. Rassendyll's servant and I followed the constable of Zenda up to the door, or within a few feet of it. Here Sapt, who was in uniform, loosened his sword in its sheath; James and I
looked to our revolvers. There were no lights visible in the lodge; the door was shut; everything was still. Sapt knocked softly with his knuckles, but there was no answer from within. He laid hold of the handle and turned it; the door opened, and the passage lay dark and apparently empty before us.
"You stay here, as we arranged," whispered the colonel. "Give me the matches, and I'll go in."
James handed him the box of matches, and he crossed the threshold. For a yard or two we saw him plainly, then his figure grew dim and indistinct. I heard nothing except my own hard breathing. But in a moment there was another sound--a muffled exclamation, and a noise of a man stumbling; a sword, too, clattered on the stones of the passage. We looked at one another;
the noise did not produce any answering stir in the house; then came the sharp little explosion of a match struck on its box;
next we heard Sapt raising himself, his scabbard scraping along the stones; his footsteps came towards us, and in a second he appeared at the door.
"What was it?" I whispered.
"I fell," said Sapt.
"Over what?"
"Come and see. James, stay here."
I followed the constable for the distance of eight or ten feet along the passage.
"Isn't there a lamp anywhere?" I asked.
"We can see enough with a match," he answered. "Here, this is what I fell over."
Even before the match was struck I saw a dark body lying across the passage.
"A dead man?" I guessed instantly.
"Why, no," said Sapt, striking a light: "a dead dog, Fritz." An exclamation of wonder escaped me as I fell on my knees. At the same instant Sapt muttered, "Ay, there's a lamp," and, stretching up his hand to a little oil lamp that stood on a bracket, he lit it, took it down, and held it over the body. It served to give a fair, though unsteady, light, and enabled us to see what lay in the passage.
"It's Boris, the boar-hound," said I, still in a whisper, although there was no sign of any listeners.
I knew the dog well; he was the king's favorite, and always accompanied him when he went hunting. He was obedient to every word of the king's, but of a rather uncertain temper towards the rest of the world. However, de mortuis nil nisi bonum; there he lay dead in the passage. Sapt put his hand on the beast's head.
There was a bullet-hole right through his forehead. I nodded, and in my turn pointed to the dog's right shoulder, which was shattered by another ball.
"And see here," said the constable. "Have a pull at this."
I looked where his hand now was. In the dog's mouth was a piece of gray cloth, and on the piece of gray cloth was a horn coat-button. I took hold of the cloth and pulled. Boris held on even in death. Sapt drew his sword, and, inserting the point of it between the dog's teeth, parted them enough for me to draw out the piece of cloth.
"You'd better put it in your pocket," said the constable. "Now come along"; and, holding the lamp in one hand and his sword (which he did not resheathe) in the other, he stepped over the body of the boar-hound, and I followed him.
We were now in front of the door of the room where Rudolf Rassendyll had supped with us on the day of his first coming to Ruritania, and whence he had set out to be crowned in Strelsau.
On the right of it was the room where the king slept, and farther along in the same direction the kitchen and the cellars. The officer or officers in attendance on the king used to sleep on the other side of the dining-room.
"We must explore, I suppose," said Sapt. In spite of his outward calmness, I caught in his voice the ring of excitement rising and ill-repressed. But at this moment we heard from the passage on our left (as we faced the door) a low moan, and then a dragging sound, as if a man were crawling along the floor, painfully trailing his limbs after him. Sapt held the lamp in that direction, and we saw Herbert the forester, pale-faced and wide-eyed, raised from the ground on his two hands, while his legs stretched behind him and his stomach rested on the flags.
"Who is it?" he said in a faint voice.
"Why, man, you know us," said the constable, stepping up to him.
"What's happened here?"
The poor fellow was very faint, and, I think, wandered a little in his brain.
"I've got it, sir," he murmured; "I've got it, fair and straight.
No more hunting for me, sir. I've got it here in the stomach. Oh, my God!" He let his head fall with a thud on the floor.
I ran and raised him. Kneeling on one knee, I propped his head against my leg.
"Tell us about it," commanded Sapt in a curt, crisp voice while I
got the man into the easiest position that I could contrive.
In slow, struggling tones he began his story, repeating here, omitting there, often confusing the order of his narrative, oftener still arresting it while he waited for fresh strength.
Yet we were not impatient, but heard without a thought of time. I
